Arranging Flowers: The Best of Martha Stewart Living

Book Description:

One of the greatest pleasures I know is the pleasure of arranging flowers. To experience the joy of handling nature's precious gifts of colorful, scented, extraordinary
blooms and to coax them into displays of unparalleled, albeit confined, beauty is for me akin to picking up a paintbrush and capturing their vibrant glory in the style of great still lifes by Rcdon, Matisse, or Bonnard. Walking through my garden, I am constantly amazed by the bounty that a bit of intense gardening will provide. From late winter, when the oddly colored hellebores peep out from a dusting of snow, to latest autumn, when rose hips glisten in the pelting rain, there are so many materials that demand inclusion in arrangements. I was four when I made my first flower arrangement. We had just moved from a small apartment in Jersey City, New Jersey, which had no yard, to the Elm Place house in Nutley that would become our family home and garden. I was allowed to pick the early tulips that Dad had planted the year before and place them carefully in a vase. Dad watched every move, and told me about height and width and proper containers. I was his willing student and assistant. The garden was mostly for vegetables for Mother's kitchen,